Archive for March, 2012

Are you ready for Monday, April 2nd? Do you have all of your tools ready? What about your work schedule? Where are you sending the kids?

Wait a minute – you don’t know what happens on Monday? You must have just returned from another planet or out from under a rock! It’s the release of the 1940s Census! A whole army of volunteers (but we need MORE!) has registered to index! Have you? What are you waiting for? Stop reading (but please bookmark this post) and go register at The 1940 Census – Getting Started!

Let’s get the list in order!

What to tell your employer (or employees if you own the business!)

National 1940s day – they must be able to tell you why April 2 is important in order to get off work.

You don’t need an excuse – you requested this day off a very long time ago (about the time the 1930 census was released!)

You will be “out of pocket” all day and unable to be reached.

Tools needed:

Download indexing software (I downloaded mine several weeks ago!)

Viewed the tutorials (I did too!)

Participated in the 1940s Indexing Simulation (I did that the day it was available)

Have indexed other images already (yep – about 1000 names so far!)

Computer (You will want to make sure to clean out your cache/cookies; do a defrag so you’ll get optimum speed)

A gedcom or .paf or some sort of family history program or report in front of you with the names of those you are searching

Along with the names you are looking for, you also have as much information as possible next to the names: what enumeration district(s) you hope to find them in, a street address in order to find them in the ED; who was possibly in the household.

Water bottles and snacks – because you have to keep up your strength so you can search AND index constantly.

An accurate clock – so you can begin as soon as possible!

A charged phone (or battery laptop!) – just in case there is an emergency and you must be reached or you need to reach someone – especially if you need to call someone (a parent/aunt/uncle/cousin) to ask where they or their parents/grandparents were living in 1940!

Big sign on your front door that requests visitors not knock or ring bell or solicit. Mail or package deliverers are to leave items at your door but not announce themselves.

Several Camp Rock, Hannah Montana, iCarly, Wizards of Waverly, Power Rangers, Victorious, Star Wars, etc. DVDs to keep the not so little ones busy after they get home from school.

Prepared meals in the fridge with step by step instructions on how to heat so no one bothers you.

Ear buds/Ear phones and tons of music so you can listen all day long instead of being distracted by the television, children’s voices, etc.

And don’t forget to get a good night’s sleep the night before so you won’t get worn out on Monday. After all – we have a lot to do!

And most importantly, please INDEX while you are searching! After all, it’s not every day that history like this happens, and we all should want to be front row center when it does! You never know where serendipity happens!

PS – I’m supposed to tell you that this post enters me in a contest for prizes – gift cards (and who doesn’t love gift cards!)

As I sit watching “Finding Your Roots” hosted by Henry Louis Gates, Jr., questions pop out at me. Harry Connick, Jr. wonders why his 3rd great-grandfather, James Connick, enlisted to fight for the Confederacy during the Civil War. That led me to wonder why my great-grandfather, James E. House, enlisted as a soldier in the Union Army. Did he disagree with slavery? Was he afraid Ohio and the North would be over run with “those Southerners”? James hadn’t yet married so he didn’t have a wife and a family to support. Perhaps he wanted to help his parents, Florus and Julia.

I realized that I can’t quit asking questions as I research – the answers to those questions enable me to flesh out my ancestors.

It’s the amount of days before the 1940 US Census is RELEASED – FREE!!!

That would be images – not an index. How do we make sure the index is completed as soon as possible? We ALL step up and volunteer to index!!! You can go here. Just fill out the information and voila! You are registered! If you have a blog and want to promote the 1940s Census, you can sign up to be a 1940 Blog Ambassador. Just click on the registration link and sign up!

I did! And I have this cool looking badge (above) to show that I’m an Ambassador!

“I don’t have time index!” (What you are thinking to yourself, right?) If you have time to search – by Enumeration District – or Browsing through pages and pages of census records, then you do have time to index!!! Give it a try! Just index ONE PAGE. After you do that one page, someone else will also re-index in order for the arbitrators to check for errors and clarity. I guarantee that if you do one page, you’ll realize that it is not that time consuming and you’ll soon find yourself downloading another batch, or two (or more!). And if you download a batch and realize that there is just no way you can 1) read anything or 2) you don’t have time just then to index or 3) you don’t understand what to do – it’s ok! There are links you can use to get help – to fill out the index, tips on reading handwriting, or you can save your batch & work on it later, or send it back and ask for another batch.

If you belong to a genealogy society – recruit the members to help index the 1940 Census. The more people who start indexing on April 2nd – the faster the complete index will be available!!!